Book review: The Jesus You Can't Ignore

The Jesus You Can't Ignore

John MacArthur

©2008, Thomas Nelson

"This book will reinvigorate your intimate understanding of the Savior. Verse by verse, John MacArthur unpacks the conversations between Jesus Christ and the leaders of his day. MacArthur's conclusions about the Jesus we have ignored are unmistakable and bold. In these pages, you'll see a vivid portrait of the Messiah as he is rarely seen: declaring truth without apology, with clarity and love...to the offense of many who heard him."

That is a big, in-your-face promise from the inside flap of the book. Does it deliver? Let's take a look.

The theme of the book is all the conflicts that Jesus had with the religious leaders of his day, and the fact that there were plenty of times where Jesus was not "nice" to them. This is quite a contrast to the popular portrayal of Jesus, which has Him as meek, mild, compassionate, and tolerant to a fault. And indeed, He was all those things, except when it came to people dishonoring His Father. That's when this other side of Jesus came out.

Dr. MacArthur takes great pains from the beginning of the book to point out that combativeness should not be our primary tactic, and confrontations such as those in the book should be reserved for teaching that clearly violates the truth of scripture. "Many disagreements are so petty that it would be utterly unprofitable to engender strife over them." (p. xi)

MacArthur spends considerable time discussing the "postmodern" or "postevangelical" church, which seems to define itself by its lack of conflict and acceptance of all ideas and beliefs. Personally I haven't been exposed to this new movement, sometimes called the Emergent or Emerging Church, so I find it confusing that churches would not consider the Bible to be absolutely true or allow unorthodoxies inside all in the name of "consensus." Dr. MacArthur hints that some of the largest churches in America have fallen into this trap, which I find quite disturbing.

Wait, what about Jesus? Isn't this book about Him? Yes, once we get past the prologue and introduction. Starting from the first major public appearance of His ministry, the cleansing of the temple in Jerusalem during Passover, we see that Jesus did not come purely to be nice, or to build consensus. We see, through chapters such as "This man speaks blasphemies", "Breaking the sabbath", "Hard preaching" and "Unpardonable sin" that Jesus not only aggressively defended the truth of His message, but He frequently instigated conflicts with the religious leaders by doing and saying things He knew they would find offensive.

This is quite a change from the "Jesus was a pacifist" attitude that seems common today. So what are we to learn from this? How are we to follow the example left by Jesus? MacArthur is quick to point out in all of the documented incidents that He is attacking only the false teaching, not the people themselves, at least until the very end when they are too far gone to recognize the truth. And He was never combative over minor differences or uncertain things, only when the authority of scripture was called into question.

I think the whole philosophy of the book can be summed up in a couple of paragraphs from p. 171:

So let's be absolutely clear about this once more: Jesus' harshness with the Pharisees does not give us an unrestricted license to deal roughly with others every time we happen to disagree. Gentleness should characterize our relationships with people, including those who persecute us (Luke 6:27-36). Love "suffers long and is kind...bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things" (1 Corinthians 13:4, 7). Those are general rules that should be paramount in all our interaction with others.

Nevertheless, Jesus' constant friction with the Pharisees does show that conflict is sometimes necessary. Harsh words are not always inappropriate. Unpleasant and unwelcome truths sometimes need to be voiced. False religion always needs to be answered. Love may cover a multitude of sins (1 Peter 4:8), but the gross hypocrisy of false teachers desperately needs to be uncovered — lest our silence facilitate and perpetuate a damning delusion. The truth is not always "nice."

So there you have it. Be nice, until it's time to not be nice. But always make sure the truth is behind you.

Overall rating: OUTSTANDING